~~
The next day, he was alone again. Scar had people to meet, cadres to organise, and neither Wire nor his Dad would answer his knocks. So Snow walked down to the docks, needing to just get out of there and be around people. Normal, sensible people.
And he found them, busy and thriving people going about their blessed lives. Mariners organising the docks, tying boats off and preparing shipments, Shields on leave enjoying the ocean, and civilians waiting calmly to leave or hovering by the deliveries, hoping their goods had arrived. As Snow watched, boats left, taking people and broken armaments with them, and more arrived, carrying delicate goods like eggs.
He spent most of his day watching the docks and seeing the boats disappear over the horizon. It was mindless, enjoyable, but he couldn't help thinking of home, Aureu and his idiocy.
In particular, one memory kept sticking out. Years ago, Songbirds had nested in their home's lemon tree. Every morning they chattered, sang, enjoyed themselves and cheered Snow when he woke. He gave them names and started studying birds so he could understand them. It was a magical few weeks, especially when their young hatched. He had spent hours watching these hatchlings waddle in their nests from the grass below.
Snow smiled at the memory. They had been great days.
But Wire had hated the Songbirds. She had ordered his Dad to clear them away. Snow hadn't known this right away, but the birds had somehow sensed something was wrong: they started to sing less, their young just sat in their nests like statues. Somehow, it came as no surprise to them when his clapping father scared them away; then covered the tree in foul-smelling tar to dissuade their return. Thankfully the young could fly by then, but for weeks Snow had nightmares of what might have happened if they couldn't fly. He'd dreamt of plunging fragile bodies splatting pathetically against the grassy floor.
His smile fell sharply. Had his parents been right? Had that been what Sol would have wanted? No. And yet Wire was convinced it was okay, and his Dad had acted accordingly. It made Snow wonder if he should have stayed in Aureu and faced the consequences. Was his acceptance of a wrong act why he felt as though Sol had abandoned him, why he kept questioning why this had happened to him?
In time the sun disappeared beneath the shoreline, killing the day. Snow found no answers at the dock. He sighed; then returned to Scar's home, unable to shake the image of dying baby birds.
15
Bite brought Maya four meals the next day, as varied as they were delicious: gammon sandwiches for breakfast, a light, crunchy salad for brunch, steak pie for lunch, and then omelette filled with cheese and sausage for dinner. Maya gorged, allowing herself this one day of greed, and her tongue sang with delight. How tired it had grown of its diet of dull, plain food.
Between breakfast and brunch, Maya slept again, her body claiming what it was owed. After brunch she meditated. Her mind was a cluttered mess, filled with conflict, despair, and unanswered questions.
Some things she came to terms with quickly: she definitely no longer wanted to die before the Disciples. That had been a plan borne of depression and immaturity. And of emotional shock. She had fetishized her home and built it up so much during her weeks of planning that the reality had knocked her back. So many of her hopes and so much of the strength that let her escape the Academy was built on her parents saving her.
It was almost embarrassing, but she needed to temper her arrogance: no one was perfect.
Other questions she could not answer – maybe she never would – so she put them out of mind, leaving them for when she'd gathered more time and maturity. With her discipline, ignoring contradictions and hypocrisy would be easy. After all, it was what was expected of a Contegon...
After her meditation, she went to her window. Seed was secreted away from the world like a pearl, but it still behaved like any other village. She watched the people of Seed go about their days through thick glass, trying to get a sense of them. She saw hard-working, simple people who knew their places in life.
She didn't want to think why, but she had to wipe tears from her eyes as she watched them.
That evening, her room was attacked. Forcing his way upstairs, some drunk marched up the stairs and shouted that he would take 'the golden pot.' Maya listened as he bashed her door, her short sword at the ready.
Fortunately, a deep-voiced man came and spoke to him quietly, patiently. “C'mon Cap, you don't want to do this. We've told you that the girl inside has weapons,” he said.
“She'll not know what's hit her!” the would-be robber roared.
“I think she will, with all your shouting. And if you try anything, you'll have to answer to me,” the deep-voiced man warned. There was menace in his voice, such that Maya knew he wasn't joking.
This didn't seem to be enough, though. There was a struggle, the thwack of knuckles on meat, then heavy footsteps going dragging something.
“What happened last night?” Maya asked innocently when Bite brought her breakfast the next day: more gammon, this time armoured in eggs and flanked by an apple and a pear.
“Someone decided to rob you, sire. We persuaded him not to.”
“I certainly wouldn't like to debate you then.”
Bite laughed and left Maya to her breakfast.
This second day passed with more rest and some exercise to sharpen her skills. That night, Maya ventured into the tavern. She felt strong again, didn't fear being attacked, but mostly she needed to be around people so she could plan what to do next. Maya needed to understand how she would react to the company and companionship of Seed's people. Because one thing was clear: she didn't do too well when alone.
Bite's gaze was the first to greet hers. Incredulous, she seemed to doubt what she was seeing. There were more people in too; drinkers who talked quietly to one another and eyed Maya as though she'd sprouted a second head.
“Evening, Bite. A glass of your finest wine, please.”
The barmaid nodded and knelt, almost falling out of her top. She produced a bottle of dusty wine from beneath her bar. With a pop, she opened it and poured pale crimson into an undeserving wooden mug.
Maya took the drink and raised it to her lips. Then, as the first test of her reactions, she offered a toast. “To Sol!” she shouted, raising the mug further
No one joined her. Interesting. She smiled and swallowed the wine. It was good, had amber tones and a fruity after-taste. As the warm haze of alcohol rose behind her eyes, she sat and watched the evening pass.
The tavern filled. Her mugs of wine emptied. Keeping to herself, Maya reaped odd looks and hurried whispers. Seed would have little gossip of worth, so a stranger would naturally dominate their chatter. And seeing her in the flesh, slowly drinking her way to oblivion, only increased their curiosity. In some, it increased their lust.
The wine made their gazes amusing. She grinned. Bite, thinking herself subtle and Maya inebriated, gave her customers warning looks or gestured for them to sit back down when they stood.
Maya wondered who she thought she was protecting.
One customer failed to take Bite's subtle hints, dropping himself on the stool beside her. He sat in silence, as though he hadn't noticed Maya, and didn't have to order his drink: he just placed wooden coins on the bar when a mug appeared before him and drank with the intensity and practised air of a carpenter whittling a masterpiece.
“What's your name, friend?” Maya asked. She'd never met an alcoholic before.
“Friend, she says! Can we have friends in this world, knowing so little of one another and so much of the Disciples? Sitting here, in the Axe, she calls me a friend,” he told the air before him. His speech, reasoned and even, rolled out effortlessly, as much a part of his routine as finishing his mug and sliding wooden money across for his next drink.
“I think we can have friends. Why wouldn't we be able to? The Disciples rage at our borders, fighting the faithful,” Maya sipped her wine to stop herself spitting, “and getting no further, so they shouldn't hinder friendship.”
r />
“A philosopher, I see.”
“No, a teenager.”
The last of his current drink slid down his throat, and he turned red-rimmed eyes on her. For a moment there was such pain in those brown irises that Maya wanted to cry: loss, torment, and sadness marked his sunken, sallow face.
“You sound like you have a problem, sire,” he said. “And we know who solves problems!”
“Don't,” Bite whispered, furious.
Others in the bar groaned or shouted warnings. He ignored them, his gap-toothed smile sparkling in the candlelight. Standing, he stretched his arms wide and breathed in deeply. And then, of all things, he started to sing.
“Penny had a twisted leg, her foot stared at her ass,
but The Woodsman rubbed it better then he took her in the grass!”
Unable to help themselves, two drunks shouted “Hey!” in time with this odd ballad. Everyone else watched him, shocked or appalled. His singing wasn't that bad. The alcohol in Maya smiled, wanted to hear more.
“Now Bob, he was frustrated, he'd been limp since his birth,
but The Woodsman's soup made Bob stand tall and at twice the girth!”
“Shut up or I'll gut you. I mean it,” some tall, grizzly critic said, rising to add weight to his threat. Maya reached into her robes, touched a knife inside.
“Well, well, well. Some people don't get it. What did you think sire?”
“Interesting, definitely interesting. Who's The Woodsman, though?”
“Just a folk hero,” Bite cut in, placing a free drink on the bar for the drunk.
He closed his open mouth, looked nervously above Maya's head, then wrapped a calloused hand round his gift. “Yes. He is but a folk hero.”
Sobriety returned like a blow to the head. Something else was going on here. Slowly, subtly, Maya looked up. Just below the ceiling were murals of a man wearing green. Carrying an axe, he smiled whether bringing a bird to life or restoring a woman's limbs and letting her 'thank' him.
How hadn't she seen this before? Had she been so drained that she hadn't looked up? Such a basic mistake. This 'Woodsman' was performing miracles all around them, saving people. She examined the painted scenes discreetly, and tried not to blush at how often the Woodsman's help ended in sex.
Maya realised something: people came here and sacrificed their time and money; the tavern was called The Axe; the ceiling was covered with the Woodsman performing miracles; talking about him to a stranger had been frowned upon; no one had joined in her toast to Sol. This wasn't a tavern. It was a temple. She was amongst believers.
Maya's mood darkened. She'd run so far and yet... She finished her drink with one, prolonged draught and returned to her room in silence. There were no motifs on her ceiling, thankfully. She curled up in bed and fell into dark sleep, tears drying on her cheeks.
16
Chain tried to forget about Wasp, concentrate on her exams, and for the most part she succeeded: she ran through Aureu with weights across her shoulders and didn't hope he'd see her; when asked to hike into the Gravit Mountains and bring a rare flower back, she hauled herself up cliff faces and barely thought of him; and when she fought fellow Contegons, armed with only a dagger, she did not think of the triumph she'd felt at besting him.
No, not at all.
It became harder to not think about him as the days passed. She had to wonder whether he'd given up and found an easier conquest. Wasp didn't seem the type to give up... so maybe he'd not been interested in her after all.
She definitely didn't feel dejected. Her time at night was not spent thinking about him instead of studying, and she did not lose sleep over him at all.
Nine days after the Ball, someone knocked on Chain's door. Expecting to be woken early during her trials, she lay out her armour and weapons every night, so she could dress quickly. From the knock to being ready, barely a minute passed.
Chain opened the door, reserving her greeting until she saw who was there. It wasn't a Contegon or a Cleric as expected but a Messenger. Young, as most were, he wore his dull grey uniform as though it were a curse. And he looked at her with childish defiance, something which genuinely shocked her.
Not that Chain would ever allow that to show. “Yes, Messenger?” she asked.
“Are you Contegon Justicar?”
She could not believe the gall of the boy. “That would be 'Are you Contegon Justicar, sire?'. That's how you address me. Try again.”
“Why?” he asked, incredulous.
As if she hadn't had enough of being treated as lesser, of the looks and the whispers of her brethren... Now Messengers were disrespecting her! She could just about accept it from her peers and knew that one day they would regret doubting the power of her faith, but from a Messenger it was too strong to bear and...
Chain noticed he did not carry a sack, which would hold his other letters for the Academy. Then he must be a private Messenger. So...
“Wasp sent you, didn't he?” she asked.
The boy's eyes widened. She was spot on.
“He's a sod, making you act like that. I was seriously considering disciplining you, Messenger. You're a credit to your profession for keeping that up.”
The Messenger looked down at his scuffed shoes, relieved. “Th-thank you, sire. It was very hard to do that to a Contegon, but Sire Wasp sent me, yes, with orders to 'wind you up a little' before giving you something, sire. A letter.”
It was not good for Wasp to do such things, let alone allow the behaviour to pass onto others. She knelt down and talked seriously to the Messenger. “Never disrespect me or another Contegon again, regardless of your orders from your customer. Doing so is the work of Lun.”
His relief disappeared and was replaced by guilt.
“The letter?” Chain asked.
He slowly produced a folded envelope. The paper was pure white, expensive. It seemed a shame that the Messenger had folded it, but maybe that was part of the ploy, part of the game Wasp was playing with her.
She resisted a small smile. No, she didn't feel elated. Taking the letter, she unfolded it and checked the penmanship. Neat, large, looping: the style of an educated and practised show-off. It was definitely Wasp. Chain did not feel her heart rise in happiness.
“Go and remember what I said here. Sol's blessings upon you,” she said, closing her bedroom door.
After a moment, and a sigh of relief, the Messenger sprinted away. Chain felt satisfied at having passed on the teachings of the Sol Lexic and turned from her door.
Laying down, she opened her letter. It was sealed with gum, not wax, but she'd expect that from an Artificer who produced stationery this expensive. Chain was careful as she didn't want to ruin the envelope when she opened it.
Inside was a folded slip of paper. She held it up to Sol's light. Thick, smoother than marble, the paper was worth more than gold.
“Ostentatious sod,” she whispered.
All Wasp had written was a time and a place: eight o'clock at an address in Sol's Greeting. It was on the Circumference, the road nearest Sol's Haven. There was nothing interesting about that street apart from it being such an expensive area with no restaurants, no cafés... only houses.
Had she been invited to his house?
Wasp had said he was mourning. Were both his parents dead? Did he own one of the most expensive homes in Geos? If so, it was no wonder he was so showy.
Money didn't impress Chain. She grew up in a wealthy family, the daughter of the previous Guardian's chef. Being invited to Wasp's home, brought into his life, had made an impact on her though. Maybe, she admitted, her heart did swell at this thought. But it was just infatuation, mere girlish attraction.
Chain closed her eyes and pictured him. Then... then she realised what she was doing. Standing up, shaking her head, she left her room. She was a Contegon, she couldn't act like this, could not moon around over some boy.
She decided to go and start training now. Her examiners wouldn't expect her so early, so she should
get bonus marks on what was hopefully her last day of judgement. If the Contegons weren't ready for her, she would practice with her axes.
Of course, she would still go see Wasp... Even a Contegon was allowed to pursue romance.
17
Dawn rose. Maya quickly followed suit. There was definitely more to this Woodsman, and she was determined to find out what it was.
After washing, she collected her belongings and locked her room from the inside, to slow the villagers down if they came after her. It was a slightly paranoid act, but Maya didn't trust the faithful. To avoid detection and leave people believing she was still asleep, she opened her room's window and dropped to the ground, rolling twice.
Seed had not been roused by the sun's first peek over the horizon, so Maya could move through it unmolested. Her plan was to map the streets and find the drunkard by deduction and intuition.
But she got lucky. After ten minutes of methodical searching, she found her target almost lying in the street. He was asleep in a doorway, propped up like a decaying, discarded doll. Snoring, a key lay in his hand. Maya almost couldn't do this, couldn't wake this poor creature who failed to defeat even his front door. Almost. But she did, poking him with her boot.
He flinched, eyes racing behind closed eyelids. Another poke brought a groan of unhappiness. The final prod stole his equilibrium. He slid into the door frame. The impact finally woke him. “Whu?” he managed.
“Morning, friend.”
He looked up, his eyes sunk deep into his head and his mouth drooping. Saliva dripped from chapped lips, and his hair stood at contrary angles, as though each hair was unwilling to touch another. “Whu?”
His perplexity meant that no one else challenged him about his drunkenness. How... sad. “I said morning. I thought you might like to be inside rather than out here in the cold.”
“Thank you for...” he yawned. Lonely, yellowing teeth peered out from his lips like curious rats as he did. “Thank you for waking me. How, how horrendous, falling asleep like that! What must you think of me?”
Maya said nothing, simply smiled.
The drunkard stood precariously, searched his pockets, then realised he held his key. At length, he unlocked his small, poorly-kept home and a dusty hall with flaking walls cried out to Maya from between the door and its frame.
“Still, you must be thanked. Would you like to come in for breakfast? I don't have much, but what I do have may be agreeable for a wandering soul such as yourself.”
“The invitation I'll accept, but I'm afraid I've already had breakfast,” she lied. It wouldn't be the last lie she'd tell him.
“All right then. In you come!”
Maya's resolve to use him wavered again as he led her into a small, decaying kitchen. He was a wreck with painful memories to drink away. Children's drawings, both in frames and on the walls, made that painfully clear. The house was a lonely testament to how far he had fallen. And she was about to manipulate him.
But... she needed to know more, to disprove the Woodsman's existence even. She felt it like hunger or thirst. She had to do this. Maybe just so there would be a community of people who'd understand how it feels to fall from a faith and find only an unaccepting world to live in.
Her host toppled into a rough wooden chair and leaned on a worn dining table. Though the bottles which littered its surface in various states of emptiness suggested this was now a drinking table.
“Sit, please. As I said, I don't have much to offer, but the kindness you showed deserves something, yes, something. But wait, here's me – the host – putting my wishes onto you when I've not asked what might help you. Forgive my addled senses! Tell me what, if anything, can I do in return for you helping me? Ask anything. I'm a man of action as well as words, you know.”
He reached for a bottle, contradicting himself with a quick swig of something with an alcoholic stench.
Maya didn't show her distaste. “There is... yes, there could be something.”
Her affected coyness got the reaction she hoped for. “Just ask. I'll help with anything!”
She adopted the drunkard's speech patterns. “I hope to hear about this Woodsman character. I've never heard of such a person, and I'd love to know more.”
“That's all? Nothing beyond hearing Seed's beliefs?”
“Beliefs? Interesting,” Maya thought.
She said, “Definitely. I may even consider myself in your debt, friend, so interested in hearing about the man they worship in the Axe am I!”
He looked up, considering this. “We worship him in the Axe indeed, though not only there: a small statue in the, the, the forest is where we worship the Woodsman truly. The Axe is a tribute, a memorial to the good he's done over the years.”
“It doesn't look like the men should be grateful if that's how he treats their women!”
“Ha, no! No, they would not at that. But that's a ruse, sire, a deceit used to cover Seed's non-adherence to the dogma laid out by the rulers of our fair land! No, the Woodsman, has not 'taken' any woman after granting favours, though many a fanciful young girl has claimed that very thing when their misconduct comes to light of a Coupling Night!” He cackled, drank again.
“So they worship him? What for, what does he provide that Sol doesn't?”
His eyes widened and a measure of fear rose from behind the alcoholic glaze within them “Oh, oh no! No, I've revealed our secret to a Solarist! No, what have I...”
Maya gritted her teeth. Her whole body tensed. “I am not a Solarist, friend. It would do you well, better than anything in life, to remember that.”
“Oh? Oh. Oh! Then things are all right: no feeble-minded blabberer am I! Actually, I could tell you weren't a Solarist, you hold yourself differently, as though your power comes from within. Yes, though I'm glad I realised it before I started to yammer. I am thankful for my own guile!”
His sentences were punctuated with sips of alcohol, and he finished with a grandiose swig. Wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, the drunkard took a deep breath.
“Anyway. Yes, anyway, you asked me what the Woodsman provides that Sol doesn't? Uhuh, you did. Well, The Woodsman, as is hidden for all to see in the Axe's cunning ceiling, actually helps you! He does! You go, you make your case in eloquent writing, and then he helps if you cannot solve the problem yourself: for he's shrewd as well as powerful. An example is when Thread went to him to change her husband, who beat her, drunkenly forced himself on her – oh, he was a terrible man that Start – but her beseeching got only a curt reply of “You can solve this.” And he was right: she went home, stabbed him to death!”
He started laughing and put down the now-empty bottle. “Ha! He deserved it, everyone said so. And the reply was in The Woodsman's hand, so the act went unpunished. And rightfully so.”
Maya touched her chin in interest. “So people who have need of a miracle, something that they cannot bring about alone, go to a statue in the Prime Woods and leave a letter there. Then what happens?”
“You sleep there, sire. Some say The Woodsman is a dream, and he can only work when we join his world. Others say he's hideous and wants to hide from his petitioners. I think he just doesn't want to be followed back to his den, sire.”
Silence. The drunkard used it to reach for another bottle and proceeded to drink in long swigs. Maya stared into the distance, fighting her temper. How could these people abandon Sol but come to something even more ridiculous? The Woodsman? The Woodsman?
“May I ask a personal question, then?” she asked after her ire fell. “If The Woodsman provides miracles, why not go and see him? I don't mean to be rude, but surely his aid could resolve your... addiction?”
The half-empty bottle flew out of his hand. Liquor splattered the walls like blood. “Get out! How dare you? I am not addicted, I, I am in the best of health...”
“Would your family say that if they could see you now?”
Calling out his alcoholism, using emotional blackmail, these were risks and... morally du
bious. But searching the Prime Woods would take days, and it would be best if a local were with her when she found this statue. No one else would come with her, so she needed his help.
Maya held her breath. The drunkard eyed her, bleary, angry.
“No. No, they would not,” he whispered. Robbed of his pomp, he was quiet, small and ill.
Maya almost walked out then, turned away from abuse and manipulation to find herself in the world. Still lost, still a young girl with no one and nothing, she couldn't be thinking right: finding this 'Woodsman' would not help. She went to stand, preparing to flee.
The drunkard interrupted her thoughts. “You may be right, sire.”
But... here was the opportunity to scratch an itch. She could prove to someone else that what she'd learned from the book, what had caused her to leave Aureu, was true. Her escape could mean something if she brought the light of truth to Seed. So she stayed put, and her mind set like molten metal. There would be no more wavering from now on.
Recalling her studies in psychology, Maya decided to adapt her approach. “By goodness, look at me. You invite me into your home and I insult you, demean you! How rude I am...” She held the drunkard's gaze with forced empathy. “You just seem so... wrong, here. Clearly you're a man of intellect, character, but you're drinking at dawn and slowly wasting away. It's also clear that something did this to you, and you have no hope of things getting better. I saw this, I tried to present a solution, but all I did was insult. Please, friend, accept my apologies.”
As she spoke, she watched his misery become tarnished with hope.
“You honour me by considering me so. You're young, your approach is allowed to be ham-fisted, indelicate. It's a defining quality of youth if you ask... if you ask me.” A tear rolled down his face, travailing creases and wrinkles. “I dare say you may have saved my life! Yes, yes indeed! I shall go to The Woodsman, my problem in hand, and seek his advice. How blind was I to not see this? Ah, but I am old, set in my ways, and don't have the innocence of one such as you.
“Anyway, I have paper and pencils, so I shall start now. Yes, yes!” He jumped to his feet and ran from the kitchen, unbalanced and desperate. When he reached the hall, he bounced off the wall, but sped on regardless.
After a minute alone in this man's private temple to imbibing, Maya followed. She found him in a small dusty room, sitting at a desk covered in papers. An anorexic bookcase was the only other furniture and the top shelf was filled with toys. In this dead room, he scribbled across old paper, hunched like a willow branch.
“Would... would it be rude to ask what brought you so low?”
“Rude? No. But painful.” He took a deep breath, and his voice became hollow, empty. “My sons, twins, joined the Shields aged sixteen. They wanted to fight the Disciples. We didn't want them to go. The town didn't want them to go. But they took the Blood Oath not to speak of the Woodsman and left. We didn't even get a goodbye. Strong boys, they were. Determined. They were killed in their first encounter. My wife, she died of grief thereafter.”
“I'm sorry,” she said, images of her plan to fight the Disciples flashing through her mind, “it's no wonder that you've fallen into such difficulties.”
Silence rose between them until he stood, finished. The effort of drinking all night and then putting his feelings, private between him and 'the Woodsman,' to paper had been great. He almost collapsed. Partially out of concern, Maya ran forward and caught him, propped him up.
“Friend, you're in no state to go now. Rest up, regain your strength, then...”
“No, no, no and no! I cannot. There can be no rest for me. I've not dreamt in years. I need to go there now. Please, please, sire, intelligent and graceful sire, take me there. I'll direct you. Just afford me this time. Please.”
“It's okay, it's okay: I'll gladly take you.” Maya winced. That she felt pain at hearing him beg her to do what she'd convinced him to only proved she was human. It was just her training that allowed her to act with dispassion and manipulation. She wasn't an unfeeling monster.
She wasn't.
The drunkard descended into plaintive repetitions of his gratefulness. So Maya walked him north to the Prime Woods. It was still early, so no one noticed her dragging his body out of town. She had no idea what she'd do if caught.
At that moment, she was as unbalanced as the man she 'helped.'